As you begin to dig deeper into the main story of Avowed, you’ll find more and more morally grey choices to navigate. One such presents itself towards the climax of An Untimely End, where you meet your killer, Ygwulf. Except you’re alive now, and you need to deal with him.
Avowed is full of these choices as you make your way through the Living Lands. Solving the mystery of your own death is the point and purpose of An Untimely End, but how you go about it has ramifications that reach far beyond this bit of your playthrough. So, who is Ygwulf, and should you kill him? Or should you just let him walk away? Here’s a breakdown of all the rewards and potential consequences for how you deal with Ygwulf.
An Untimely End full walkthrough in Avowed
Meet Marius
Much of An Untimely End is pretty self-explanatory, as you’ll be following your map marker and dealing with some fights here and there. After you wake up from your death at the hands of a mystery killer when entering Paradis, you head over to the Aedyran embassy to speak with Ambassador Hylgard, who you just saved from a Dreamthrall bear in the Strangleroot. After speaking with him, you’ll all agree that finding your assassin is probably the best course of action, and Kai suggests you get Marius to help, an old friend.
Marius is a Dwarven Ranger, and he’ll become the second available companion in your party after you meet him at the the Grinning Balarok in town. You can choose to intervene on his behalf when you see him get into an altercation at the bar—but you don’t have to. Marius has it covered, and the scene that plays out is funny.
Track the assassin
Marius will agree to help track down the assassin, which involves searching some rooftops at the scene of the crime, talking to an apothecary and fighting some toughs in the Pearl District, and finally, making your way to Hightown, the northern section of Paradis. Keep on following that quest marker to the recently deceased Claviger’s house and take out the bandits that have set up shop there, then go on a little search of the estate. You’ll notice a locked door upstairs; you can get around this by going outside an open window on the opposite side of the home and doing a little parkour up to another open window.
There, you’ll be able to find the Claviger’s journal, revealing he had helped the Paradisan rebels set up shop beneath the Temple of Ondra. Marius and Kai agree—it’s time to visit the temple.
Find the rebels beneath the Temple of Ondra
Confront the priestess at the Temple of Ondra, who’ll give up the jig and tell you the rebels are hiding in the cistern below, and among them is your killer—Ygwulf. There’s a door to the side of the temple sanctuary that leads to the cistern. Take it, then go room by room, clearing out the rebels, who will attack on sight. There may theoretically be a way to sneak through this section without fighting the rebels, but I didn’t find it—either way, fighting and killing rebels in these early rooms before Ygwulf won’t lock you out of any choices for the end of the quest.
Meeting Ygwulf
Ygwulf gets his own small cutscene upon entering the final room of the hideout, and you can speak with him. He’ll express remorse for killing you, admitting that he believed he had to do it because he saw your face in a vision. Your recovery from death, however, has changed his mind that it was the correct course of action. And, finally, he leaves you with a choice: Go and let the beleaguered rebels be without any more violence, or take justice into your own hands and fight him.
All consequences for killing Ygwulf or letting him live in Avowed
Let Ygwulf live
If you let Ygwulf live and agree to leave without any violence, a few things happen. For starters, Ygwulf gives you the key to get out of this final room. A purple chest waits just beyond this door, and you can exit out into Paradis again. You might have some explaining to do to the Aedyrans about why you didn’t kill your own assassin, but you won’t have to fight Ygwulf.
What’s more, you’ll receive a Writ of Passage from the rebels.
The Writ of Passage essentially gives you some good favor with the rebels when you encounter them again. And you can in Emerald Stair, the next area of the game.
Kill Ygwulf
This one has more rewards but also more consequences. If you kill Ygwulf, you’ll still get his key to leave the passage, and you can also loot his Blackwing Armor, a unique light armor that buffs stealth attack damage range and crouched move speed for all you stealth archers out there. No offense, but I do see you.
On the other hand, the rebels won’t be fond of you, and they’ll attack you in the streets of Paradis as you make your way back to the Aedyran embassy. After you put down these attacks, the rebels will leave you alone—for the most part. The final bit of revenge from the rebels will be on an old friend of yours. You’ll be able to find the guy who pulled you out of the shipwreck at the beginning of the game and helped you through the early tutorial sections, Garryck, gruesomely murdered by the rebels, with a note on his body addressed to you.
Finally, the rebels will essentially give you a “last warning” when you arrive at Emerald Stair in the next section of the game, but they’ll back off after that. You can even still talk to them peacefully.
How to beat Ygwulf in Avowed
If you haven’t been doing a bunch of side quests and leveled up your gear rarity before this quest, Ygwulf is a really tough fight. I was a little surprised at how many times it took me to beat him, given this was only the second or third real boss fight of the game and I didn’t have any problems with the first couple. There are a couple of good pointers for beating this fight, though.
The fight against Ygwulf has two phases: an initial one where you fight against Ygwulf and the other rebels in the chamber when you first enter, and then a second phase where he regenerates his health back to full and another wave of assassins comes to join him. This second wave has tougher allies to fight against, so be wary of it.
Crowd control is your best friend here. Both Kai’s Leap of Daring and Fire and Ire abilities will aggro enemies, while Marius’ Binding Roots can hold down one enemy in place for a bit of time.
Keep track of your companions’ cooldowns and use their abilities to keep Ygwulf busy while you clear out his allies. They die much faster than he does, and thinning out their numbers is the surest way to stay alive and in this fight. Much like Ygwulf himself, several of these rebels can dash towards you and hit hard with their attacks, so be careful and mind your health, popping a health potion when you can.
If your companions go down, revive them even in the middle of the fight. I made the mistake of ignoring them in favor of just swinging my sword, and I died quickly without their support as a whole gang of assassins was suddenly focused on me. You can revive them from wherever you are with the Dream Touch ability, or you can run up to them and revive them manually. Even the manual revive is worth it, as it’s quick and you should be able to get it off if you’re not incredibly low health, allowing you a much better chance of continuing the fight.
Eventually, you’ll clear out all the allies, and the three of you will be able to overwhelm Ygwulf with CC and damage.
Should you kill Ygwulf in Avowed?
Personally, I think killing Ygwulf is worth it if you’re running a light armor character and want a solid upgrade to your armor. The Blackwing Armor also looks really cool, so you’ll have that going for you. This does come with role-playing downsides though, and if you got particularly attached to Garryck in the intro, this might not be the best path for you.
Letting Ygwulf live doesn’t come with much tangible benefit to you outside of role-playing, as the Writ of Passage hasn’t done me much good in my playthrough. Even if you kill Ygwulf, the rebels are willing to begrudgingly talk to you in Emerald Stair afterward, and they won’t significantly hamper your journey.
